After a few weeks as a student
in the MFA writing program at Columbia, I realized that I wasn’t going to be
able to write at home. Every time I sat down at the desk in the dining room
my wife began vacuuming. We weren’t getting along and spending more time
together didn’t help things. My plan was to write three hours a day,
beginning at nine, after I’d taken my son to kindergarten at P.S.84, a few
blocks away, between Columbus Avenue and Central Park West. The
neighborhood was in the midst of a large urban renewal project and was
filled with deserted tenements. The new buildings were supposed to have
special units for the local residents, who were being displaced, though
eventually hardly any of them were allowed to remain.

But I wasn’t thinking about the
low-income residents being squeezed out of the neighborhood. I was just
worried about a place to write in, and I ended up renting a room on the
tenth floor of a tall, narrow residential hotel on Riverside Drive and 80th
Street. The hotel was run by a Japanese company and was filled with
students and young professionals from Japan. My room was tiny, with just a
single bed and a desk and a wooden chair. But it had a view of the Hudson,
and the flow of cars on the west side highway sounded like the ocean.

I’d look out the window, and
soothed by the traffic sounds I’d forget everything and start writing. My
stories were about seductive, slender Japanese women. I became so excited
that I had to urinate often. My room had a door that led to a small
bathroom that I shared with another room. The man in the other room also
seemed to pee a lot and I listened constantly to hear if he were in the
bathroom. Every time he flushed the toilet and slammed his door I’d rush in
to pee, afraid he’d come back and lock me out. Some days we seemed to have
a contest over who could pee more often. Once I saw my neighbor unlocking
his front door as I walked to the elevator. He was thin and non-descript
and wore thick glasses and was holding a notebook.

Every morning when I arrived at
the room and sat down at the desk I felt a sense of happiness and
excitement. I liked looking out at the Hudson and then closing my eyes for
a moment and pretending that the traffic from the highway was really waves
breaking onto a beach. I felt as if I was becoming a writer. One night at
dinner I told an old friend of mine about how productive I had become. He
was a lawyer and the next day he called to ask if Dave, a colleague of his,
could share the room with me. Dave had a writing project and wanted to use
the room in the late afternoon. Splitting the cost of the rent seemed
irresistible and I agreed, though I wasn’t comfortable about having someone
else in my private space.

A few weeks after Dave started
coming to the room I was stopped at the front desk by the manager. In
broken English, he told me with an air of betrayal that I’d have to leave.
“Your friend bring girls,” he said. “Not that kind of place.”

“But he told me he was writing,” I said.

“No more room,” the manager said and held out his hand for the key.

I was
embarrassed by the thought of Dave bringing girlfriends there and making me
look like I was a procurer, and I handed the manager the key. With no place
to go, I began spending time at Columbia in the study halls and at Butler
Library. Soon I was writing stories about full-breasted Barnard girls. But
sometimes, sitting in the crowded study at Lewisohn Hall, I’d think of the
room on Riverside Drive with its view of the Hudson and the soft sounds of
the highway and the flushing of the toilet and wish that I could be back
there, waiting for my neighbor to slam the bathroom door.